a clever kiwi kayak trip ...

It was time to give our legs a rest and exercise our upper limbs with a sea kayak trip along the coast of Abel Tasman National Park.

Unlike the "I'm going to die in a freak boating accident" experience of kayaking at Halong Bay in Vietnam, this was actually a fairly relaxed affair as we paddled gently up the coast on a gloriously sunny day. Along the way we saw all sorts of wildlife, most notably a fur seal swimming alongside us.

In New Zealand they really do have this sort of trip perfected. Rather than paddle back for 6 hours against a strong headwind, they send a water taxi (basically a 12 seater speedboat) to pick you up from the beach. On our way back we stopped briefly to observe a little blue penguin splashing around in the sea, before making our way back to port.

To our surprise it wasn't a jetty that awaited us, but a partially submerged tractor. We sailed right onto it's attached trailer before being hauled onto dry land.

Rather than getting us to disembark for a more conventional form of transport back to the kayak centre, the tractor just carried on 2km along the seafront with us still sat in our boat gazing out at the bemused pedestrians.

It all made for quite a memorable day. And not a rogue seagull in sight.